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Publisher: Infogrames Developer: Rainbow Studios The Bottom Line: With intuitive control, superb graphics, and a catchy soundtrack, Splashdown is an excellent Jet Ski racing game and another fine title in a series of fine titles that have been coming lately from Infogrames. A few nagging flaws aside - the lack of a true 1 on 1 versus mode and some questionable course design chief among them - Splashdown is more than worthy of your gaming dollars if youre a fan of the genre or if you simply enjoy a well rounded racing game. A Closer Look: As seems to be the case with virtually every niche sports title, the gameplay in Splashdown is predicated on successfully performing tricks. Throughout each of the games many courses are ramps that - surprise, surprise - send you airborne. While in the air youre able to perform tricks by holding either the L2, R1, or R2 button and then pressing a direction on the left analog stick. More complex tricks require holding L2, R1, or R2, pressing a direction, and then moving the left analog stick in quarter, half, or fully circular motions. Each rider has in excess of 20 moves, including a signature move specific to each, so not repeating on moves isnt too difficult. There are a total of 8 riders, each from a different country and with a different personality. Their personality is largely portrayed via the expressions they use, like the American Andy Pierce who seems to say Duuuude! a little too much. Four of the racers are immediately selectable while the other four have to be unlocked by successfully beating them in a 1 on 1 challenge on a special indoor course. Performing tricks fills up your riders Performance Meter, which in turn improves your top speed and acceleration. Your maneuverability and overall control is unaffected. The meter constantly drains so youve got to keep performing stunts throughout each race. Exploiting your riders entire repertoire of stunts is crucial because repeating stunts youve already performed only gives your Performance Meter a small percentage of the total boost you get from performing a stunt for the first time during any given race. In each course are a series of buoys that you have to navigate through. Missing a buoy hurts your Performance Meter. If your meter is empty and you miss a buoy your engine will stall. Graphically, Splashdown excels in virtually every category. The riders look incredibly lifelike (and they move like it too), the water undulates so realistically that it almost seems indistinguishable from the real thing, the transparencies on the water are perfect, the framerate is crisp, theres no popup, the light sourcing and shading is excellent, and theres a minimal amount of aliasing. There are a total of 20 courses in the game spanning locales such as the Florida Everglades to the canals of Venice, Italy to The Great Barrier Reef in Australia. Each stage does an excellent job of replicating its namesake. For example, in the Venice stage youve got to maneuver around gondolas and in the Everglades there are floating moss covered logs and partially submerged vehicles to contend with. Of the 20 courses only the first 12 are accessible when playing on the easy setting. Unlocking those 12 on easy also makes them accessible on normal, but if you play on hard and unlock all 20 they are accessible on each difficulty setting. There are shortcuts on each course that really come in handy when playing on normal or hard. The reason being that path on each course is different in easy mode than it is in normal or hard. For the most part the courses are fairly lengthy and well designed, but they all share a single flaw that works against the games trick system. Even though there are plenty of ramps with which to do tricks off of littered throughout all of the stages, its extremely difficult to get enough air to chain tricks together. It is possible in some spots on some stages, but not that often. So, youll find yourself performing one single trick after another without the ability to spice things up a bit and chain a bunch of tricks together. Cranking out tricks is further hampered by the cutthroat way that the computer plays. Not only will your opponents aggressively jockey for position, but oftentimes they sandwich you and even land on you coming off of a jump, causing your rider to go hurtling through the air and into last place. They do this on the easy setting and to a greater extent on the normal and hard settings. Splashdown also does an admirable job in the sound department. Everything from your Jet Skis motor to the sound of crashing waves to the thud of a wipeout is accurately replicated. As for the soundtrack, a slew of bands were recruited to supply it, including - among others - KMFDM, Blink 182, and Smashmouth. Even if youre not very fond of those bands, their brand of light speed rock is well suited to the game. The one notable downside comes in the form of the various expressions the drivers use. It doesnt take long before you find yourself wishing that your driver was a mute. As mentioned above, the lack of a true 1 on 1 versus mode does hurt the game a bit, mostly in the replay value end of things. While you can play the game against a friend without the accompaniment of computer opponents, you can only do so in two modes - Copycat and Coundown. Both are a little too simplistic to offer any real lasting power. The Copycat mode has you and a friend performing tricks whereby the first player performs a trick and the second player has to do the exact same trick of the game ends. Countdown mode entails gathering balloons to stave off a clock that is constantly counting down. You collect balloons for as long as you can until the clock reaches zero. If you want to race on a track against a friend and without any computer opponents youre out of luck. Theres also a nice Freeride mode that lets you explore every nook and cranny of each course, although it primarily serves as the method by which you collect little colored balls that unlock additional wetsuit colors for your riders. The development team at Rainbow Studios also opted to inject a little bit of humor into the Freeride mode, most evident on the Barrier Reef track. If you drive your Jet Ski far enough off the course and into the desolate ocean surrounding it a huge suctioncup-laden squid arm will grab and throw your rider all the way back onto the course, which amounts to him or her doing a really good Superman impression. In the final analysis Splashdown ranks as a very enjoyable racer thats solid in just about every respect. While it does suffer from a less than complete multiplayer experience, some suspect course design, and a slightly unoriginal gameplay system its still a superb racer in its own right and one of the best available for the PS2. If youre a fan of Jet Ski racing, Jet Ski racing games, or just a good racing game of any kind you should definitely get a hold of a copy of Splashdown ASAP. Pros/Cons:
Graphics: A-
Sound: A-
Gameplay: B+
Replay Value: B Overall: B+ Disclosure: Core purchased this title for review directly from retail. -Ian Johnston
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